"Proofreading Thomas Jefferson" Response

    In important documents, punctuation is very important, especially in a document as important as the Declaration of Independence. According to “Proofreading Thomas Jefferson” by Veronica Majerol, a stray period was found in a sentence that could change the whole sentence’s meaning. The author is unbiased to some extent, although she shows how a stray period could change the meaning of the sentence and the “meaning of American democracy”. The author supports this claim by showing examples of how the stray period being a period or comma would affect the sentence.
    The stray period is in the paragraph that begins “We hold these truths to be self-evident.” The stray period in question follows the phrase “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. Majerol uses Professor Danielle Allen’s quotes to help the reader understand why this punctuation change can affect the sentence. Professor Danielle Allen is a professor at the Institute for Advance Study in Princeton, New Jersey, which makes her quotes have more impact. “The period teaches people that that’s the end of the thought,” says Allen, “and then you’re starting a new one.” By explaining what the period symbolizes, the author makes it clear why adding a period after this phrase would change the meaning. The phrase after this is “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...” The author then explains that assuming the stray period is a comma means that to Jefferson, the government securing people’s rights were just as important as “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” “You lose that connection when the period gets added”, says Allen. It is still an ongoing debate on whether it is a comma or period.
    Majerol also shows why getting this right is so important, by adding the opinion of another and then ending with a quote from Allen. She adds a quote from Eugene Volokh, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He claims that the distinction between commas and periods “almost certainly didn’t exist when the Declaration and the Bill of Rights were drafted. It was a more oral culture back then, he notes, and punctuation was used primarily to capture the rhythms of speech.” The author adds this quote in to capture the perspective of someone else’s point of view and compares it to Allen’s point of view by ending the article with Allen’s quote. She does this to make the reader think and compare the two opinions on their own in a subtle way. Allen states that even though it might not seem important, it is because this document is connected to our government and “We should get right what’s in them.”
    Although I understand both sides of this argument, I agree with Allen’s point of view more because I believe that information is important, no matter how it may look. It is part of our history and since it also relates to the government, it is important we know what the Founding Fathers thought. After reading this article I realized how much this matters, as well as how much of a difference punctuation makes.